'Beijing Blogger' Hao Wu freed after 140 days
"At the same time, 50 other people are currently in prison in China for writing about ‘subversive’ subjects online,”
Chinese blogger and documentary filmmaker Hao Wu has been released by the Chinese authorities after nearly five months in detention. His release was announced on her blog by his sister, Na (Nina) Wu on Tuesday. Nina has been steadily campaigning - along with much of the blogosphere - for his release.
Hao was arrested on 22 February while preparing a video report about an underground Protestant church. He was held in isolation for 140 days, during which he was never allowed to receive the help of a lawyer. The Beijing Public Security Bureau (PSB) never revealed the reasons for his arrest. He was said to be “under house arrest” but he was never allowed to receive a visit from his relatives or to telephone them. The PSB said this was necessary because there had been a “breach of national security.”
“Let us not forget, however, that Hao was kidnapped by the Chinese security services, which violated his most basic rights by claiming that his case was a matter of national security,” the press freedom organisation, Reporters Without Borders said.
"At the same time, 50 other people are currently in prison in China for writing about ‘subversive’ subjects online,” Reporters Without Borders continued. “China is by far the world’s biggest prison for bloggers and cyber-dissidents. We would also like to pay tribute to the courage of this blogger’s sister, who battled relentlessly for his release.”
Reporters Without Borders wrote to Chinese President Hu Jintao in March asking him to intercede on Hao’s behalf. The organisation also addressed requests for help to the European Union, including a 10 July letter to European Parliament president Josep Borrell asking him to raise the cases of Hao and two other imprisoned cyber-dissidents during his 8-14 July visit to China. This request was made just four days after the European Parliament adopted a resolution about online free expression that mentioned Hao.
More about Hao: From Scientist to Computer Guy to Filmmaker.
Hao began his filmmaking career in 2004, when he gave up his job as a senior product manager at Atlanta-based Earthlink Inc. and returned to China to film Beijing or Bust, a collage of interviews with U.S.-born ethnic Chinese who now live in China’s capital city. Before working for Earthlink, Hao worked as a product manager for Internet portal Excite from 2000 to 2001 in Redwood City, CA Before that, Hao had also worked as a strategic planning and product development director for Merchant Internet Group, an intern for American Express Co. and a molecular biologist with UCB Research Inc.Hao earned an MBA degree from University of Michigan Business School in May 2000 and a Master of Science in molecular and cell biology in July, 1995 from Brandeis University, where he was awarded a full merit-based scholarship. Before studying in the U.S., Hao earned a Bachelor of Science degree in biology from the China University of Science and Technology in Hefei, Anhui province in June, 1992.
Hao the Blogger.
Hao has also been an active blogger, writing as “Beijing Loafer” on his personal blog, Beijing or Bust, named after his film. Due to Chinese government internet blocking of his blog hosting service Blogger.com, he also has a mirror version of the site on MSN Spaces. In early February Hao began contributing as Northeast Asia Editor to Global Voices Online, an international bloggers’ network hosted at Harvard Law School’s Berkman Center for Internet & Society. Writing under the pen name Tian Yi, Hao’s contributions aimed to bring citizens’ online voices from China and the rest of North East Asia to readers in the English-speaking world.
James MacGregor's original report